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| The Learning Resource Center, taken from the southwest in 2010. |
Opening Day
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| Caption from the Stevens Point Journal on 7/15/68: A bulldozer was the podium as President Lee S. Dreyfus spoke at groundbreaking ceremonies. |
July 15th, 1968, was bright and clear as Chancellor Lee Sherman Dreyfus stood on the bulldozer that broke ground for the new library building, named the Learning Resource Center (LRC). Wisconsin State University–Stevens Point had almost immediately outgrown the previous building and library staff were desperate for a new space. The LRC was projected to become the hub of campus academic life, holding not just the library books but other forms of instructional media, meeting rooms, instructional spaces, and academic support offices. At six stories high it was the tallest point on campus.
Dreyfus called the Learning Resources Center:
“A link with our cultural heritage and with the 20,000 students who have gone through WSU since its founding 75 years ago.”
Library staff who helped design the building included director Nelis Kampenga and Syble Mason, who had been a staff member since 1930. The old library had 32,994 feet of usable space. The LRC had 84,565 feet of usable space, and full central air and heating, too!
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| Original floor plans for the LRC. Photo from the UWSP Archives. |
The Learning Resource Center opened on Monday, April 9, 1970, to a campus of almost 9,000 enrolled students: an increase of almost 30% since 1967. In the almost two years since groundbreaking the student body and academic landscape at WSU-SP had expanded. In 1968, the Museum of Natural History was established inside the Science Hall. It quickly outgrew the space and moved to the LRC in the summer of 1970. In the same year, WSU-SP began offering majors in soil science, drama, home economics in business, water resources, and a graduate program in natural resources. All these new courses led to an expansion of library materials. While the library collection contained over 200,000 items, there was room for up to 300,000. After opening, the building was dedicated to James H. Albertson and quickly became known as the Albertson Learning Resource Center, and later, Albertson Hall. During the dedication, it was noted that:
“The building is tall, stately, and filled with a bank of knowledge to help prepare young people for the challenges and problems of tomorrow. It is much like the man it memorializes.” (Reich)
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| Students use the new library in this photo from the 1970 Iris. Photo from the UWSP Archives. |
In the 1970 Student Handbook for Albertson Learning Resource Center, students were informed that most of the collection was on the first to fifth floors. The Instructional Materials Center (IMC) was in the basement. Just like the old library building, the card catalog, reference room, and circulation desk were the major hubs on the first floor. Rentable typewriters, microfilm copying, and paper printing were available inside the building. The second floor was the hub for periodicals, including approximately 1,500 magazines that the library subscribed to. Once a month the LRC staff hosted a trip to the Memorial Library on the Madison college campus and graduate students could request a seat on the bus, although priority was saved for faculty.
The library was converting from the Dewey Decimal
System to the Library of Congress organizational system; the collection was
about half moved, so items were separated by which system they were integrated
into. Collections and card catalog entries were regularly rearranged during the first
few years in the LRC until all items were converted.
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| A comparison of library catalog cards from the 1970 Student Handbook. Photos from the UWSP Archives. |
Accessibility and Expansion
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| Students browse card catalogs on the first floor in the 1970s. |
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| Students visit the LRC in winter of 1971. |
In 1974, fifteen new curb cuts were added to
campus and in May of 1976, Chancellor Dreyfus signed a program statement
outlining projects for making campus more accessible. Dreyfus acknowledged that
there were not just college students who needed these changes, of which he said
there were about seven each semester, but also about 40 children enrolled in an
on-campus learning center named the Chileda Institute, four or five faculty
members, and members of the public. He mentioned that even just expanding the
curb cuts on campus had increased enrollment of students with disabilities.
“About one tenth of the total university population has at some time during the year a handicapped disability of some sort, which would include such items as sprains and/or breaks. Having a complete handicapped facility throughout the campus would things much simpler for everyone concerned” (Dreyfus).
While the UWSP campus was
undergoing intensive accessibility auditing, concerns about the structural
stability and usability of Old Main were surfacing. In 1977, the removal of the east and west wing additions was approved, along with renovation of the
original structure for use as an administrative building. This renovation saved
the building from being completely razed. Construction on Old Main coincided with a major expansion to
the LRC. The first floor was expanded, and wings were added to the north and
south side of each floor. This was an $8.3 million expansion project that was
completed by fall of 1986, adding about 47,000 feet of space.
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| A 1979 map of UWSP. Notice that Old Main has had the wings removed and the LRC has not been expanded. Photo from the UWSP Archives. |
The expansion to the LRC was for both accessibility and the need for more space.
Just like the previous library building, once the collections moved in, there was very little room for growth. In 1980, the
library had over 300,000 items, which was considered max capacity for the LRC!
In 1982, the UW System identified the LRC as the number one
building for improvement. It was estimated that the
collections needed 50,000 more feet of space. To store collections, conference rooms and study spaces had been converted into stack space. Aisles were shortened, too, from 40 inches between bookshelves
down to 30 inches. If students with disabilities were struggling to access
materials before, this shelf rearrangement basically barred them from browsing.
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| Students use the LRC television recording studio in 1977. Photo from the Horizons yearbook, from the UWSP Archives. |
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| Students use computers in the LRC in 1982. Photo from the Horizons yearbook, from the UWSP Archives. |
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| The LRC expansion project, completed in 1986. Photo from the UWSP Archives. |
Technological Innovations and Minor Expansions
On March 15, 1986, the newly-expanded LRC was rededicated to James H. Albertson and his commitment to student success. Tours, live music from the UWSP Woodwind Quintet, displays and demonstrations from the Museum of Natural History, and genealogy workshops from the Portage County Historical Society and Wisconsin State Historical Society all supported the event.
The rededication also helped promote the
technology available inside the building. By 1986, the library had 35 personal
computers for students to use; that was about 1/5 of the total computers on
campus. Later that year an information technology systems network was
established in the basement of the LRC, where it would stay until the building
was closed in 2023. Decades of students would know that office as the place to
rent a computer, borrow a test clicker, or visit for technology
troubleshooting.
In the 1990s a
physical change occurred on the LRC 4th floor with the establishment
of the Wisconsin Center for Environmental Education, which had the goal of
promoting the development, dissemination, implementation, and evaluation of
environmental education programs in Wisconsin. A digital change was happening
across the library, too. By 1994, there was a digital card catalog for browsing
the library holdings instead of a paper card catalog. Staff were using computer
systems to check out materials instead of paper ledgers. By this time the
reference collection had started subscribing to electronic sources, including digital
periodicals. The library had more than 1,600,000 items, including 286,000 books
and 58,000 bound periodicals. What were the other items? Those included photos,
documents, microfilm, VHS tapes, and educational tools like puppets and
puzzles. Even in the student services building, the library had been known for
offering more than just books. The expanded space in the LRC allowed for
greater diversification of student resources.
In 2002, the lobby was
remodeled. Barrier-free security gates were added to the first floor, librarian
desks were consolidated into a single service point, a grand staircase was
added from the lobby to the second-floor periodicals, and more comfortable
furniture was added to all levels. In fall of 2002, after this remodel, the
library welcomed 77% more visitors than in the fall of 2001, with over 209,000
visitors touring the space. That increase wasn’t for one semester, either;
across the entire academic year facility use increased 32%, and in the
following year there was a 12% increase in students served by librarian
presentations and a 23% increase in reference questions asked at the desk.
Digital resources saw a large spike in use, with 1.7 million searches performed
on library computers, a 67% increase in online library catalog searches, and
78,000 digital resources being circulated.
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| A photo of the LRC lobby, taken in 2005. |
Riding the technology wave, in 2003, the LRC activated the very first wireless demonstration rooms on campus. Wireless laptops were available and incredibly popular. By 2005, the 12 laptops were being checked out over 400 times each month.
In 2004, a small physical remodel increased accessibility by widening the door widths of the elevators and replacing the carpet on the second floor, which was worn and posed a trip hazard. Physical library item growth was still continuing, with almost 2 million items in the library in 2004.
In a survey sent to faculty, staff, and
students, 36.29% of undergraduate students and 42.53% of faculty reported using
the physical library resources weekly. 42.86% of graduate students and 50.57%
of faculty reported using digital library resources weekly. This was in part
because of how fast digital resource access had grown; in the 1997-98 academic
year the library could provide over 4,000 journal titles between print and
online sources. In the 2004-05 year, that figure rose to over 12,000, and by
2008, the library provided over 15,000!
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| A photo of the LRC reference room, taken in 2005. |
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| Horseshoes & Hand Grenades performs in the LRC lobby at the 2011 Hootenanny. |
Closure of the Albertson Learning Resource Center
Knowing the growth it had since opening in 1970, and how the building was so regularly adapted to meet the changing needs of the college community, why did the LRC close on June 22, 2023? Would you believe that space was an issue? It certainly was, along with structural concerns and a fire suppression system that was prone to corrosion and leaks.
Library staff moved the majority of materials to a building in Plover and added a circulation and reference desk to the Collins Classroom Center on 4th Ave. Students could still request materials from the off-campus storage location, which were delivered daily. A new library space was constructed over three years and cost $96 million, opening in spring of 2026, with full services available in fall of that year.
The new building, named the Library and Student Resource Center (SRC), is 33,000 square feet smaller than
the LRC and contains more student resource offices than the LRC did. However,
new shelving and design plans were used to maximize the usefulness of the space
available. Only time will tell how the library handles the smaller building
after 130 years of collections growth.
This story is built from primary sources held in the UW-Stevens Point Archives, records that continue to document the people, spaces, and work that shaped the library over time.
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| A photo of the new SRC, taken in spring of 2026. Photo from the UWSP blog. |
Below, find additional information and sources used in this blog post.
Circulation and collection data, from SAGE Data:
General circulation transactions:
- 2002: 96,941
- 2004: 101,440
- 2008: 70,316
Total physical and digital circulations for books and media:
- 2014: 50,159
- 2017: 166,422
- 2020: 162,762
- 2024: 188,301
Physical books, backfiles, and paper materials in collections:
- 2000: 978,112
- 2008: 1,065,315
Number of physical book, media, and serial publications:
- 2014: 665,400 (missing serials)
- 2016: 441,087
- 2020: 530,276
- 2024: 438,842
Number of digital/electronic books:
- 2014: 34,727
- 2016: 247,207
- 2018: 566,935
- 2023: 772,656